Joaquin Phoenix kept things decidedly real during his Golden Globes acceptance speech and subsequent backstage press interaction on Sunday night.
Phoenix, who won for his turn in Todd Phillips' Joker in the Best Performance in a Motion Picture (Drama) category, profusely praised the profusely praise-worthy decision to make the evening's selection of food entirely plant-based while calling on those in the room to make sacrifices in the name of climate change.
"It’s great to vote but sometimes we have to take that responsibility on ourselves and make changes and sacrifices in our own lives," he told those gathered for the ceremony. "I hope that we can do that. We don’t have to take private jets to Palm Springs sometimes . . . I’ll try to do better and I hope you will too. Thank you so much for putting up with me. I’m so grateful for this night and all of you."
The I'm Still Here mockumentary star also noted there's "no fucking best actor" and referred to himself as a "pain in the ass," expressing gratitude to Phillips and the Joker team for giving him grace during production. His annoyingly bleeped-up by censors speech also featured the hilarious line "Contrary to popular belief, I don't want to rock the boat but the boat is fucking rocked." Not to mention his remarks about the broadcast being "created for" advertising purposes.
Backstage, Phoenix remained candid, openly lamenting the tired line of questioning centered on how he developed his Arthur Fleck character for the film. He also again praised the plant-based layout of the evening. "Isn't this old news? I feel like I've talked about this for six months . . . You wanna hear a different version of it?" he said.
Joker also took home Best Original Score honors thanks to the work of composer Hildur Guðnadóttir.
